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West Midlands Safari Park: General Discussion

I'd argue that bar location, the two target the exact same market: families! Chessington is probably the closest rival to West Midlands and hopefully this will see investment in both parks.

I agree they need some proper meat and potato rollercoasters. A eurofighter, basic boomerang or even just a custom layout steel coaster with a good theme would go down like a steak to the lions
 
WMSP have released today that ALL the rides & attractions have had a spring clean during the winter, which could mean the park have re-painted some dated looking attractions, fixed the effects on Dr Umboto's Catacombs & possibly added some new theming. I also found out yesterday that the Spring Grove House will be turned into a Spa should the new WMSP Hotel go ahead. At the moment it's looking likely the new hotel, waterpark, monorail, SV Railway Station at WMSP & the conference centre will be going ahead as planned. Full statement from WMSP about the ride clean-up is below.

SUMMER IS CLOSER THAN YOU THINK!

West Midland Safari Park declares summer on Saturday, 9th February 2013 as it opens its gates to visitors every day until November.

And, not to be deterred by the recent winter chill, Libby the Park's lemur mascot was out and about having a bit of fun as the amusement rides also prepare to fully reopen for the year.

Leisure Area Manager, Marcus Hyde-Fynn, said, "The rides have been closed during our Wild Winter season and they are now looking in tip top condition after their annual spring clean - which incidentally is carried out during the winter! The Jumbo Parade is just one of our all-time classic family favourites. It can seat up to 24 passengers in twelve elephant themed carriages that can take to the air at the touch of a button and it was good to see Libby be the first rider of the season".

The last family ride to be introduced at West Midland Safari Park was in August 2012 when the £400,000 "Hurtling Hippos" was opened. It was the first ride to be specifically designed by Park staff and is the only one of its kind. "Hurtling Hippos" brought the total number of rides at the Park up to 28.

West Midland Safari and Leisure Park will be open throughout February half term and daily until Friday, 8th November 2013.

The standard admission charge is £16.99 for adults and £12.99 for children and includes a free return ticket, free car parking, four-miles of self drive safari, Penguin Cove, Creepy Crawlies, Mark O'Shea's Reptile World, Seaquarium, friendly Animal/Reptile Encounters, Hippo Lakes, Safari Express Train and the African Village which incorporates Meerkat Mayhem and Walking with Lemurs. Amusement rides are charged extra in all cases.

Further information is available from the Park's official website www.wmsp.co.uk or by telephone 01299 402114.
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Well opening day for WMSP went down a storm today! No break downs, all staff & rides on top form, fantastic start to the season! Also plans are set to appear within the next few weeks/months for the Hotel, Waterpark, Monorail & Conference Centre.
 
Monorail?! How very 80s :p Where will this be running to and from, and are there any details known about it as of yet?
 
Here it is:

860138_331342070310863_232732176_o.jpg
 
Wow, a Zacspin? That's quite an investment for WMSP! I never thought we would see a Zacspin over here for quite a while to be honest. I hope they pull it off, I really like WMSP. Even if I think their ride pricing system is a bit ott.

Also, is a Monorail necessary for a Safari park that you drive your own vehicle around? Seems an odd choice for a new "attraction" :)
 
This is an unofficial concept picture just someone showing off their design skills and not anything from the park. It's from the same person who did the concept pictures for the mack launched coaster at Drayton manor last year
 
Re: West Midlands Safari Park: General Discussion

Considering the picture has been blatantly water marked "unofficial" I can't see how anyone thinks its real!

Very well done concept by I believe imagineer john! :) he does amazing work!
 
Yeah that's John Burton's work. I think it has his website written at the bottom. Also, here's the original image he must have used:

insane4g.jpg



I was quite excited then! :( Bugger! :p
 
I read somewhere that it was planned to be a full-sized monorail, running to Kidderminster town centre...? Seems a bit of an odd plan.
 
I did pit that it was an unofficial picture, but I removed it as that was kinds stating the obvious with the water marks...
 
Yeah just to confirm that picture is UNOFFICIAL. The monorail will be built once the SV Railway Station at WMSP is done, the Hotel & Waterpark. It will supposedly connect the SV Railway Station at WMSP with the Hotel & possibly the park entrance (Lost City Plaza area). I have no idea where Sam you got the information it would connect the town centre with WMSP from, because this is highly unlikely.

 
With the utmost of respect, could you possibly re-write your post to make it a little clearer with a little less acronyms? I think the majority of us on this forum, like myself, know very little about WMSP and have no idea what 'SV Railway Station' is, or where the hotel and waterpark are being built. :)
 
"SV Railway Station" refers to the future halt for the Severn Valley Railway, one of the longest heritage railways in the UK (and the nearest one to where I live, funnily enough). I've never been to the Safari Park, but you can see one end of the site from trains shortly after leaving Bewdley when you're heading towards Kidderminster Town station.

Anyone fancy a railway meet some time?
 
Ok. Basically, the SVR refers to 'Severn Valley Railway'. SVR and WMSP are working together to create a future station at WMSP, but because the station will be towards the back of the park, they need a monorail to connect the future waterpark & hotel with the SV Railway Station.

The Hotel & Waterpark's plans are set to be released in a few weeks time (according to several newspapers) however the park may have hit some issues or things they need to tweak with the final plans. The park will be tackling the hilly slopes when they build the Hotel, Waterpark & Conference Centre, as they are all going behind the Cub's Kingdom area.

It's extremely hard to explain where the park are putting the future Hotel, Waterpark & Conference centre, but I can try to get a picture of where they will be going next weekend when I visit the park again.

The monorail, SV Railway Station, Hotel, Waterpark & Conference centre will not be done for the next 4-8 years yet, depending on how fast WMSP want to go with the project, and how much money they have to start building all of it.
 
Why are they planning on building a hotel and waterpark?! The main park needs to be expanded first, I can easily get the whole park and Safari done in less than a day - in my eyes the park needs to have enough to pack you up for more than a day before it gets turned into a 'resort'.
 
Everyone's just jumping on the bandwagon now of this ''Resort'' thing. I cant understand Alton as they have 2 hotels, evening entertainment ( which i presume they're going to expand on ) Golf, Spa and Water Park.

It just seems now that Alton made the first move everyone is following despite what they have to really offer.
 
Looking at the map, this seems a very odd decision. Surely the current SVR station at Bewdley would be about the same distance away from the hotel/waterpark as a new station? Why not just build a monorail to the Bewdley station? :/

kydog1299 said:
It's extremely hard to explain where the park are putting the future Hotel, Waterpark & Conference centre, but I can try to get a picture of where they will be going next weekend when I visit the park again.
Click to expand...

Could you possibly do a quick Paint job on a Google Maps screenshot? :)
 
Could you possibly do a quick Paint job on a Google Maps screenshot? :)
Click to expand...

Sure, I will have the map with clear outlines of where the Waterpark, Hotel & Conference Centre will be by tomorrow morning about 8am :)

Edit: In response to James comment, what the park are doing is creating a station at WMSP for the Severn Valley Railway, to let people who are visiting the park venture off on the train and back. The waterpark will provide a half day/full day experience, and the Amusement Area/Safari creates a full day experience, resulting in a short break.

With the SVR to do, Waterpark, Hotel entertainment, Safari, Amusement Area & Animal encounters/talks there is plenty to do over 2 days.

I think they are trying to base themselves as a short break destination, rather than a typical day attraction. No other Safari/Zoo has taken themselves to a level where they could provide a short break destination, so this is a big gate for WMSP to really prove themselves and make themselves known as one of the best safari/zoo attractions in the UK.
 
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